More
farmers hand over harvests to machines [Sacramento Bee]
Rumbling
through an olive orchard, a machine harvester towers over a row of trees,
stripping the small green fruit and shooting them into a rapidly filling
container. This may be the future of farming in an era of worsening labor
scarcity….The dwindling supply of workers has long been on the horizon, but
there's a new urgency for farmers to shift to machines to harvest crops around
the region and state. Farmers had significant trouble finding people to tend
and pick their crops this year, said Bryan Little, director of labor affairs
for California Farm Bureau.
Proposed
refuge expansion tough sell to S.J. ag interests [Stockton Record]
Expanding
the world's largest network of wildlife refuges into San Joaquin County would
attract rare and beautiful migratory birds, open up new boating and fishing
opportunities, and reduce flood risk in urban areas, federal officials say in a
new report. The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service says enlarging the San Joaquin
River National Wildlife Refuge is a "unique" opportunity to restore a
major corridor of wildlife habitat along the second largest stream in
California, and triple the number of refuge visitors in the process. Its plan,
however, has already faced criticism here. San Joaquin County supervisors voted
last year to oppose the expansion before it had been formally proposed….Now
that proposal is on the streets, and the executive director of the San Joaquin
Farm Bureau Federation said the federal government does not appear to have
addressed local officials' concerns. "You would think they would listen to
county supervisors, but they didn't," bureau director Bruce Blodgett said.
"It's obvious the public input process isn't what it used to be."
Merced-to-Fresno
high-speed rail opponents rethink legal strategy [Fresno Bee]
Stung
by a judge's ruling, opponents of California's proposed high-speed rail route
between Merced and Fresno are reassessing their legal strategy -- but not their
resolve….When Sacramento County Superior Court Judge Timothy Frawley refused on
Nov. 16 to block the authority from any planning, land-buying or contracting
efforts before construction begins in mid- 2013, he also indicated that the
plaintiffs suing the agency may be building their legal case on unstable
ground….The judge's remarks "were not lost on us," said Anja Raudabaugh,
executive director of the Madera County Farm Bureau. "We're looking at it
as a positive thing because we have an opportunity to assess our merits, and
how often do you get to do that in a lawsuit?" While not tipping her
organization's hand, "we will not be pursuing the same strategy going
forward," she said. "The Farm Bureau has made a commitment to see the
case through because we believe the merits are so strong."…Farmers north
of the San Joaquin River aren't the only ones with a keen interest in the
lawsuits. High-speed rail opponents from Kings County also are keeping a close
eye on developments, and a handful of them traveled to Sacramento for the Nov.
16 hearing and Frawley's ruling.
Rising
electric rates call Modesto, Turlock irrigation pricing into question [Modesto
Bee]
An
emerging debate over fairness in electricity and irrigation bills might not be
getting traction if power hadn't become so expensive. In olden days, power sold
by the Modesto and Turlock irrigation districts was relatively cheap. Steep
rate increases in recent years have erased the local advantage. Now people are
questioning the age-old policy of keeping irrigation fees artificially low by
making electricity users pay more. And changes in the law have focused more
attention on what's fair….The districts say there are important factors behind
keeping water rates reasonable. For starters, water applied to crops slowly
seeps down, replenishing underground sources. That's an incredible benefit for
which farmers get no credit, both districts say. Farmer and hydrologist Vance
Kennedy has figured the value at $14 million per year, computed at the rate
that San Francisco might have paid MID for water if a controversial proposed
sale had not been abandoned. "If you increase the cost to farmers to where
they can't afford (irrigation water), they're going to drill more wells and
exacerbate the issue," said Wayne Zipser, executive manager of the
Stanislaus County Farm Bureau.
Maker
of methyl iodide ends US EPA registration [Associated Press]
The
maker of the controversial pesticide methyl iodide, used primarily to fumigate
strawberries, has agreed to remove all of its products from the U.S. market and
end sales permanently. The U.S. EPA announced Wednesday that Arysta had
requested voluntarily cancellation of all of the company's product
registrations, which means that the suspected carcinogen will no longer be used
in this country by the end of the year. The company's decision ends more than
five years of legal battles by environmental groups and farmworkers who had
fought initial approval of the product during the Bush administration. It comes
after an announcement in March that the Japanese company would voluntarily pull
methyl iodine from the U.S. market.
Editorial: A cornucopia of
blessings to be thankful for with California's agricultural bounty [Sacramento
Bee]
…As
we have become more urbanized, most of us have gotten far away from food
production. It is easy to take that bounty for granted….California, from the
beginning of the American period, has been about large-scale agriculture (not
the small family farm of the Midwest or the Plains). The Sacramento Valley,
part of the Great Central Valley, was the state's first significant farming
region….Economies of scale have made our food affordable and accessible.
Americans spend 9.5 percent of our income on what we eat, compared with 14
percent in 1970….Yet amid this bounty, one in eight Californians does not have
enough food to eat and many more do not have healthy diets, contributing to
obesity. This breadbasket of the nation can do better, and Thanksgiving Day reminds
us of that.
Ag
Today is distributed to county Farm Bureaus, CFBF directors and CFBF staff, for
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